The Truth War (9 page)

Furthermore, in the promotion of his dishonesty, Satan employs every agent he can dupe into being a shill for him—demons, unbelievers, and (most effectively) people who are in some way actually associated with the truth, or (even worse) who merely
pretend
to be agents of the truth and angels of light. That, as we noted in chapter 1, is one of Satan's favorite and time-tested strategies (2 Corinthians 11:13–15).

It was happening already, on a wide scale, while the church was still in its infancy. After three years founding and diligently teaching the church at Ephesus, Paul warned the elders in that young congregation about what he knew would happen as soon as he moved on: “For I know this, that after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock. Also from among yourselves men will rise up, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after themselves. Therefore watch, and remember that for three years I did not cease to warn everyone night and day with tears” (Acts 20:29–31).

THE DEVIL'S ALTERNATIVE
CREDO OFTEN HAS A FEW
CAREFULLY CHOSEN
ELEMENTS OF TRUTH IN
THE MIX—BUT ALWAYS
DILUTED AND THOROUGHLY
BLENDED WITH FALSEHOODS,
CONTRADICTIONS,
MISREPRESENTATIONS,
DISTORTIONS, AND EVERY
OTHER IMAGINABLE
PERVERSION OF REALITY.
ADD IT ALL UP AND THE
BOTTOM LINE IS A BIG LIE.

The primary threat Paul was concerned about would come from within the church itself—
even
from among the elders of the
church.
He was speaking prophetically; thus the tone of absolute certainty: “I
know
this.” God had revealed to Paul that a challenge to the truth would arise from within the church's own leadership, and people would be drawn away.

It happened just that way too. By the end of the first century, when the apostle John wrote Revelation, Christ's message to the church at Ephesus included a commendation to that church for having “tested those who say they are apostles and are not, and have found them liars” (Revelation 2:2). In the same context, Christ condemned “the deeds of the Nicolaitans” (v. 6).

The Nicolaitans were a dangerous sect, and they may well have been the very “wolves” Paul cautioned against in the famous prophetic warning of Acts 20. If so, the group's teachings might even have originated with one or more of the earliest elders in the Ephesian church. (Some early sources, including Irenaeus in the mid-second century, identified the sect with “Nicolas, a proselyte from Antioch,” who was appointed to leadership in the Jerusalem church in Acts 6:5. There is no clear proof of that, but there is a considerable amount of evidence that Nicolaitanism was indeed bred and incubated by men who had achieved stature as leaders in the church.)

Apparently, when the Nicolaitans were rejected in Ephesus, they went to a nearby church plant at Pergamos, where they gained a following in that church. Christ's message to Pergamos in Revelation 2:12–17 is almost entirely given to rebuke, because the church had embraced “those who hold the doctrine of the Nicolaitans” (v. 15).

What was that doctrine? It is described in verse 14 as a kind of radical licentiousness: “You have there those who hold the doctrine of Balaam, who taught Balak to put a stumbling block before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit sexual immorality.” They were using Christian liberty as a cloak for vice and an opportunity for the flesh (Galatians 5:13; 1 Peter 2:16).

This was evidently the very same kind of error the epistle of Jude was written to address, because Jude refers to the false teachers he opposed as “ungodly men, who turn the grace of our God into lewdness” (Jude 4), and he says they “run greedily in the error of Balaam for profit” (v. 11).

Licentious behavior and greed were key characteristics of all forms of
gnosticism.
That was a deadly brand of false religion that flourished in the second century and often infiltrated the church, masquerading as Christianity. Nicolaitanism has many of the hallmarks of later forms of gnosticism. It seems to be one of the earliest expressions of the gnostic tendency in the ancient church. Clearly, similar doctrines had already intruded into the church and begun to take root when Jude wrote.

We will examine the gnostic error in more detail in chapter 4, but simply notice for now that the whole point of Jude's epistle is to confront this type of error and encourage believers to
fight
for the true faith. Notice also that Jude does not waste any subtlety or employ any understatements in his evaluation of the apostates of his day. Friendly dialogue with them was not part of his plan for dealing with their error (see also 2 John 7–11).

Apostasy
is the technical name for serious, soul-destroying error that arises from within the church. It comes from the Greek word
apostasia
, which occurs in 2 Thessalonians 2:3 and is translated “falling away.” The word is closely related to the Greek word for “divorce.” It speaks of abandonment, a separation, a defection—the abdication of truth altogether.

Can a genuine Christian fall away from the faith and become an apostate? No. Scripture is quite clear about that. Those who do depart from the faith, like Judas, simply demonstrate that they never had true faith to begin with. “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us,
they would have continued
with us;
but they went out that they might be made manifest, that none of them were of us” (1 John 2:19, emphasis added). Jesus said of his true sheep, “I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father's hand” (John 10:28–29).

Nonetheless, there are lots of apostate people. Ever since the time of Judas, there have been people who profess faith in Christ and identify themselves as disciples but who never genuinely embrace the truth. They may
understand
the truth. They may even seem to follow it enthusiastically for a while. They might identify with a church and therefore become an active and integral part of the earthly Christian community. Sometimes they even become leaders in a church. But they never really
believe
the truth with an undivided heart. Like tares among wheat, they have an appearance of authenticity for a while, but they are incapable of producing any useful fruit (Matthew 13:24–30).

An
apostate
is therefore a defector from the truth—someone who has known the truth, given some show of affirmation to it, perhaps even proclaimed it for a while—but then rejected it in the end. The typical apostate may still purport to believe the truth and proclaim the truth; but in reality he opposes the truth and undermines it. He is a traitor to the faith and secretly an enemy in the Truth War. But he wants everyone to think otherwise. Most apostates seek to remain within the church and actively seek acceptance among the people of God. Because everything they do undermines faith and corrupts the truth, such people pose a grave danger to the health of the flock—even though they usually bend over backward to appear friendly, likable, and pious. That is why Jesus compares them to ravenous wolves in sheep's clothing (Matthew 7:15).

A few apostates are outspoken and aggressive in their opposition to the truth, but most are subtler. Regardless of how friendly, benign, or self-effacing they may appear, these wolves in sheep's clothing are invariably driven by evil and self-aggrandizing motives—such as pride, rebellion, greed, lust, or whatever (2 Peter 2:10–19). That is not to suggest they always know full well that they
are
apostates. Many of them are so blinded by their evil desires that they really imagine they are serving Christ when in fact they are opposing Him (John 16:2).

Others may start out actually meaning well, but they never get past being double-minded. They are like seeds sprouting in shallow or weedy soil. They often show prodigious signs of life for a time. But ultimately their own shallowness or worldliness make it impossible for God's Word to take root (Matthew 13:20–22). Despite whatever temporary appearance of spiritual life they might display, they are incapable of producing real fruit, and they eventually fall away. Don't let the temporary appearance of spiritual health and vigor at the start fool you. When such a person abandons the faith, it proves he or she was always unregenerate and unbelieving—still dead in trespasses and sins.

Apostasy can have far-reaching and disastrous effects on an entire congregation's spiritual health. When false teaching goes unchallenged, it breeds more confusion and draws still more shallow and insincere people into the fold. If not vigorously resisted, apostasy will spread like leaven through seminaries, denominations, missions agencies, and other Christian institutions. False teaching thus attacks the church like a parasite, affecting our corporate testimony, inoculating people against the real truth of the gospel, proliferating false and halfhearted “disciples,” and filling the church with people who are actually unbelievers. By such means, entire churches and denominations have been taken over by apostasy.

WHEN FALSE TEACHING
GOES UNCHALLENGED,
IT BREEDS MORE CONFUSION
AND DRAWS STILL MORE
SHALLOW AND INSINCERE
PEOPLE INTO THE FOLD.

In fact, that has happened countless times throughout church history. It has especially happened on a wide scale over the past century and a half, wherever modernism, theological liberalism, neoorthodoxy, “process theology,” and a host of similar ideas have spread. Whole denominations (even many where the gospel was once proclaimed clearly) have been left spiritually bankrupt because error and unbelief were tolerated rather than being opposed.

Obviously, the cause of truth is hurt when this happens. People who embrace apostasy are destroyed by it. Churches wither and die because of it. Consider the fact that by the end of the first century, when the apostle John wrote Revelation 2–3, five out of the seven churches in Asia Minor were either beginning to defect from the faith or were already apostate bodies. (Sardis was already apostate; Laodicea was teetering on the precipice of final rejection.) Christ's central message to all but two of the churches included a mandate to deal with apostates in their midst. The battle for truth in the church has always been a very, very difficult but necessary conflict.

WHY THE EVANGELICAL MOVEMENT
IS IN TROUBLE TODAY

Apostasy poses real and present dangers today as always. Actually, the threat may be more imminent and more dangerous than ever, because most Christians nowadays simply don't care about the prevalence of false doctrine, nor do they take seriously their duty to fight against apostasy. Instead, they want a friendly atmosphere of open acceptance for everyone, tolerance of opposing ideas, and charitable dialogue with the apostates.

Evangelicalism as a movement has historically stood against handling important Bible doctrine in such an indifferent way—as if truth itself were pliable. Evangelicals' primary distinctive used to be their commitment to the purity of the gospel. That commitment is reflected in the word
evangelical
itself (which is derived from the Greek word for “gospel”). William Tyndale was one of the first to use the expression, speaking of “evangelical truth” as a synonym for the gospel. And the evangelical movement has always treated the gospel as the core and foundation of all truth.

Since the Protestant Reformation, the term has historically been used to signify a particular strain of conservative Protestantism in which a handful of key gospel doctrines are regard ed as absolutely essential to authentic Christianity. These nonnegotiable evangelical distinctives include the doctrine of justification by faith, the principle of substitutionary atonement, and the absolute authority and perfect sufficiency of Scripture. (Of course, necessarily implied and included in that short list are a number of other vital doctrines, including Christ's deity, His virgin birth, and His bodily resurrection.)

THE EVANGELICAL
MOVEMENT ISN'T REALLY
VERY EVANGELICAL
ANYMORE. THE TYPICAL
EVANGELICAL LEADER TODAY
IS FAR MORE LIKELY TO
EXPRESS INDIGNATION AT
SOMEONE WHO CALLS FOR
DOCTRINAL CLARITY AND
ACCURACY THAN TO FIRMLY
OPPOSE ANOTHER SELF-
STYLED EVANGELICAL WHO IS
ACTIVELY ATTACKING SOME
VITAL BIBLICAL TRUTH.

Evangelicalism has furthermore always expressly denied that any good works or sacraments have any merit before God or any instrumental efficacy for justification. So the stress in historic evangelicalism is properly placed on the primacy of faith over works. Evangelicals have always resisted the pressure to elevate good works over sound doctrine, insisting that truly good works are the fruit of faith, never a valid substitute for it.

But the evangelical movement isn't really very evangelical anymore. The typical evangelical leader today is far more likely to express indignation at someone who calls for doctrinal clarity and accuracy than to firmly oppose another self-styled evangelical who is actively attacking some vital biblical truth.

Meanwhile, much of the evangelical movement has been acting for a long time as if our
main
duty is just to keep in step with the fads of worldly culture in order to gain the approval of each succeeding generation. That strategy will never fail to find enthusiastic support among those who are immature, weak, ignorant, or cowardly, but it can never be truly effective. Without the truth, no spiritual transformation is possible (1 Peter 1:22–25; John 17:17).

Evangelicals who are so desperate to follow the culture invariably lag several years behind anyway, somehow managing to look awkward and clumsy by always failing to keep in step, no matter how hard they try. But, then, the church is not supposed to ape the world's fads or court the world's favor anyway. Jesus said, “If the world hates you, you know that it hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you” (John 15:18–19).